Tales from a Small World

"Tales From A Small World" is a collection of articles originally published on the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics Protein Spotlight site, enriched with poems by the delightfully unconventional Dublin poet, Pat Ingoldsby. Each article tells the story of a given protein - of which there are hundreds of thousands - from what it does in our body, how it does it, who discovered it, to how such information can help save lives. Here, barely a hundred proteins are described. But they give you a fair idea of the scope of activities performed by such tiny entities. You will find out why little girls are girls, and little boys are boys. Why a lobster changes colour when boiled. What it is that makes you cry when you cut an onion. Whether infidelity is particular to males. Why glue sticks. And what it is that makes an eye blue.